1. Field of the Invention
The invention uses carbon dioxide, in the supercritical fluid range, for cleaning parts, and particularly precision parts for inertial instruments by employing fluid recirculation, and fluid filtering.
2. Prior Art
Supercritical fluid systems are widely known, both for cleaning purposes and for extracting purposes, such as extracting caffeine from the coffee bean or removing nitroglycerine from gun powder. However, no recirculating supercritical fluid systems are known. Also, no such systems permitting fluid filtering are known.
The prior art is characterized by low volume, low pressure systems incapable of providing high pressure, e.g., 3000 psi recirculating fluid systems capable of fluid filtering.
One source of prior art supercritical fluid systems is:
C. F. Technologies, Inc. PA1 Hyde Park, Mass. 02136.